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Great (short!) Youth Ministry Training Podcast

Jeremy — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 02:15:27 +0000

I’ve been involved in a project to provide free Youth Ministry resources online at umyouthpastor.com for a while now. We thought about doing a training podcast for a while, but wanted to make sure that we were adding something worthwhile rather than just creating more work for ourselves. After consuming a lot of podcasts, I realized that what I wanted was a periodic training/idea podcast that was short and to the point. That is where the idea for 10-minute Training (itunes link) began.

Each episode is an interview with a talented youth minister about a specific topic covering everything from having hard conversations to indoor game idea roundups. Every episode then concludes with a resource recommendation from the guest. All in about 10 minutes.

I love and listen to tons of long-format podcasts like the SYM podcast (iTunes link), but know very few people who are both entertaining enough to listen to for that long and experienced/talented enough to have that much quality content (Doug and the gang are some of the few in youth ministry). The point of the podcast is to get you some usable information or idea as quickly as possible, or as the tagline suggests… we get to the point so you get the training. Check it out by going to the website or subscribing via iTunes.

Stats on Internet Pornography – Online MBA

Chris — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 13:45:24 +0000

I thought these stats on internet pornography were really interesting:

(click the image to view full size.)

Stats on Internet Pornography – Online MBA.

Failsafe Backup (The 321 System)

Jeremy — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 03:28:56 +0000

Peter Krough has written an excellent article on backup in which he suggests the 321 system. It says that you should have three copies (one primary and two backups) on two different media with one off-site. Not only is this incredibly easy to remember, it really helps me sift through the myriad of backup solutions to get what I need and not a lot more.

For my on-site backup, I have mentioned before that I like to use Chronosync to automatically backup selected files whenever I mount a specific hard disc or thumb drive though Apple’s Backup (free with Mobile Me) or Time Machine will meet most mac user’s needs. On the PC side of things, I have heard good things about Paragon Drive Backup and NovaBackup.

For offsite backup, I use and am really satisfied with Carbonite while Chris has written a bit about his preferred offsite backup service: Mozy. Both are great and both support Mac and Windows. The point is that you need to have your mission critical files and irreplaceable memories (photos, videos) stored somewhere that fire or flood will not cause you to lose money or memories.

I think Peter Krough said it best in his article, “There are two types of people, those who have experienced hard drive failure and those who will.” Do yourself a favor and get your 321 system in place today.

Remember to Pray More with Echo Prayer Manager

Jeremy — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 03:50:29 +0000

If I had a dime for every time I heard someone in ministry say that they did not pray as much as they thought they should, I’d be doing ministry in the Caribbean somewhere or maybe a cruise minister. Permanent vacationing aside, most of us really do want to pray more. My bet is that you feel you’d do it more if you just had something like, say, a text message to jog your memory.

That is exactly what Echo Prayer Manager does: it reminds you to pray via email or SMS. After signing up for the free account, you enter your prayer requests choosing how you want to recieve the reminder (email or SMS) and how often (more, normal, less, or non-random). Then you go over to the reminders area and decide when is the best time in each day for you to be reminded to pray.

Here’s the genius thing, unless you tell it otherwise, it reminds you of a random prayer request from your list at that time! Of course you can ask it to remind you to pray for your friend at the exact moment he is getting his appendix removed, but the real genius is that once you decide when you want to remember to pray, you don’t have to also decide which prayers to pray at which moment.

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Quick Tip: Stop Spam with Mailinator

Jeremy — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 01:00:45 +0000

It’s my experience that I can often tell when a site is going to spam me. However, there are those times when I need something, and the site requires me to fork over my email and “verify” it forcing me into the conundrum of deciding between and endless barrage of spam and whatever I think I “need” from the site. This is where Mailinator comes in. You simply give anything @mailinator.com … anything you choose… and Mailinator will have your email waiting for you when you surf over to their website:mailinator.com. Once you check your email you can have it deleted or just leave it and Mailinator will automatically delete the email in a couple of hours.

Of course there are other applications for this like giving a “persistent” teenager the wrong address or giving it to a vendor at a conference to obtain a free glowing pencil topper, but we do not endorse or participate in anything like that here. It’s just a quick tip. And it is FREE!

Live at the Simply Youth Ministry Conference

Chris — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 06:29:54 +0000

I’m at the Simply Youth Ministry Conference this weekend, and we’ve setup some opportunities for you to watch even if you weren’t able to come. I setup the site SYMCLive.com to host live video from the event. You can check out the schedule on the page.

And if you are here at the event come say “hi”, I’d love to meet you. You can find me in the Media Room (when I’m not shooting for the live events)